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Introduction: The Philippines is considered to have one of the highest concentrations of biodiversity in the world. It has a high endemicity of flora and fauna, many of which are endemic subspecies unique to each of the over seven thousand islands. As a result of rapid rates of deforestation and rural transformation, however, this biodiversity has declined precipitously, so that today the Philippines is considered to be one of the "hot spots" for biodiversity degradation and conservation. This chapter describes the results of a study conducted by a multidisciplinary team of experts in the Mount Makiling Forest Reserve (MFR) from 1994 to 1996. The study espoused a new approach to conservation, in which the focus was not directly on studying the preservation of biodiversity but on the preservation of the bio-social conditions that promote the conservation of biodiversity. The research was less an attempt to gather new data than to reinterpret existing data, to make new linkages among existing data, and to analyze the relationships among several hierarchical levels, namely, farm, ecosystem, and landscape. The study also aimed to generate new methodologies for the rapid assessment of biodiversity. Methodologies for linking the results of the study to conservation policy and management were also an important concern. The discussion begins with a floral diversity profile of the different ecosystems in the MFR. The utility of floral species as indicators is also discussed. The next section, on faunal diversity, presents an analysis of the field data on the diversity of amphibians, reptiles, birds, and mammals on the mountain and discusses the impact of habitat disturbance on this diversity. It also discusses the implication of community structure for diversity, the status of threatened species on Mount Makiling, and the sociocultural importance of fauna. The final section, on socioeconomic determinants of crop diversity, discusses the relationship between biodiversity levels at the farm or agroecosystem level and the socieoeconomic attributes fo the farmers using a rapid assessment methodology developed especially for the study. The MFR was selected for this study because it is one of the few remaining areas in the Philippines with a relatively large portion of intact natural forest containing many diverse species of fauna and flora. At the same time, it has a long history of human activity and encroachment resulting in conversion of the forest to other land use systems, which presents us with varied levels of patchiness, a wide spectrum of biodiversity levels, and a continuum of nature and society interactions.
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